Joe had gone into the forest for a few minutes of peace away from his many brothers and sisters. The sunlight streaming onto the forest floor, the soft crack of branches swaying in the summer breeze, the sounds of birdsong and rippling creeks calmed him down. He took a deep breath, swung around a slender tree trunk as if it were a partner in a dance, and smiled.
Then his smile faded. Which direction was his house in? He started off one way, thinking it was right. Nothing looked familiar. Had he passed that tree on the way in? What about that rock? He didn't remember seeing that. Within a half hour, he was hopelessly lost in a forest that went on for miles—a forest that was populated with bears, deer—and hunters.
Joe slumped against a giant oak tree, trying to think what to do. As he sat there, he noticed the bulge in his front pants pocket. It was a compass his dad had given him on his birthday last week. He’d stuffed it in his pocket and forgotten about it. Now it was just the thing he needed. Joe knew that the needle of a compass always points north, and he knew there was a Speedy Chek grocery story just north of the forest. If he could get to that, he could find his way home.
With renewed energy, Joe set off. Whistling, he ran down hills, climbed rocks, and fought his way through some thick brush, always keeping an eye on the compass. Finally, through the trees, he could see the bright red-and-green neon sign of the Speedy Chek. He was almost home.
Discussion
Have you ever had an experience like Joe's? It can be very frightening. Luckily for Joe, he had a compass!
As we pass through life, sometimes we will find ourselves in situations where we may not be sure of the right thing to do or the right path to take. During those times, we may feel lost and unsure, just like Joe did in the forest.
Fortunately, we have a built-in compass for just such situations. It's called our conscience, and it works to point us in the right direction
You may have seen the Disney movie Pinocchio. Jiminy Cricket plays the role of Pinocchio’s conscience, whispering in his ear or looking him in the eye and telling what is right to do.
Unfortunately, Pinocchio doesn’t always listen to Jiminy, and then he gets himself into trouble. This is an important point to remember. We all have a conscience, but we don’t necessarily listen to it. That’s when we make mistakes, do bad things, and get into trouble. Can you hear your conscience talking to you sometimes? How does it make you feel? Does it “bother” you? Do you have a Jiminy Cricket in your life, who reminds you what's right and wrong?
For children, their parents play the role of the conscience: “Time to stop watching TV and study for your test," "Please clean up your room before you go out," and "I have to go to a meeting—I need you to take care of your baby brother tonight.” Your parents are trying to get you to do the right thing, aren’t they? Sometimes you might feel they do it too much, and you may wish they would get “off your back.” Yet inside, we know they are right, and that they say these things to us because they care. They want us to grow up to be good and responsible people, so we can be happy as adults.
Eventually, our parents’ words become part of our thinking. When we start hearing these words inside ourselves, we know that our consciences are alive and well.
Right and wrong
The conscience is that part of ourselves that tells us the difference between right and wrong. Although sometimes it’s not easy to listen to our conscience, we should be very grateful that we have one.
Just think if people did not have consciences—in other words, no sense of right and wrong. In such a society we would be governed by the “law of the jungle" or “might makes right.” There would be no justice or fairness. People would do whatever they could get away with.
What really protects you when you walk down the street alone is that most people listen to their consciences and do not rob or attack but try to live in peace with others. The police cannot be everywhere. Without the power of the human conscience, society would be in complete chaos. The conscience is like a law within, urging people to do right and not wrong.
Some people say, "How can we know what is right and what is wrong? What’s right to one person is wrong to another." Even so, there is a lot of agreement about right and wrong. There is a generally accepted standard that acting unselfishly is good, while acting selfishly is bad. For example, everyone praises a person who leaps into a street full of traffic to rescue a child, risking himself for the child's safety. No one would praise someone who shrugged and said, "Too bad for the kid. Let her get run over as long as I'm safe." If you listen to your conscience, you will find that it encourages you to be unselfish, to act for the benefit of others, to share and to help, even at a sacrifice to yourself.
Guilt
Do you sometimes feel guilty when you’ve done something wrong? It’s a painful feeling, isn’t it? Nobody likes to feel guilty, because it hurts. At the same time, it is a good thing that we have the capability of feeling guilt, as it is a sign of an active conscience.
Think of it this way: What if you had no nerve endings in your fingers, so you had no sense of pain? If you put your hand over a stove burner, you wouldn’t feel anything. The same if you put your hand in icy water, pricked it with a pin, or even cut it with a knife. No pain. It sounds nice, doesn’t it? But it would be very dangerous. Feeling pain protects us from further hurting ourselves. It warns us of danger. Without it, we could seriously damage ourselves—even die.
Guilt performs a similar function. It is a warning to us that we have done something wrong, which is injurious to us and to others. If we never felt guilty about anything, we would end up doing all kinds of bad things. Although we may not like the feeling, guilt alerts us to what we have done wrong, so that we can take steps to make it right.
Developing our conscience
We can be thankful we have a conscience. But we have to take care of it to help it to develop properly. We have to be careful not to allow it to be corrupted, which can happen if we associate with people who do bad things, or if our minds are full of bad ideas. In the past, many people justified slavery in America by saying that black people were meant to be slaves. In Nazi Germany, normally decent people engaged in horrible acts of torture and killing of Jews under the belief they were doing good for society. These people's consciences were corrupted by bad ideas. People with more highly developed consciences had to fight against these wrongs and end the injustices.
We can come to believe that smoking, drinking, doing drugs, and having casual sexual relationships are all okay, especially if we associate with people who think and say they are. These things may not seem selfish or harmful, or else we might think we are only hurting ourselves by doing them. Yet that is not true. All these things affect and involve other people in a negative way: Second-hand smoke is more dangerous to other people than the smoke you take in yourself.
Drunken drivers kill many innocent people, including children, and almost all crime involves alcohol in some way. Drugs are connected to murderous crime networks, which you support when you use them. Casual sexual relationships always involve another person and their mental, emotional, and physical well-being—as well as having the potential to affect a child born of the relationship. These things are selfish and harmful, even if some people say they aren't.
Our consciences need to be educated in order to work well as guides. In the end the conscience is as strong as the ideas we listen to and believe in, and the virtues we practice. If we feed our minds with high ideals and act according to those ideals, our consciences will become stronger and stronger, serving as better and more accurate guides in the forest of life.
Game - Rock, paper, scissors
Two partners face each other. On the count of three, each of them chooses to say “Rock,” “Paper,” or “Scissors” [or hide one hand behind their back and on the count of three bring it out in the form of a rock, paper, or scissors]. Of course, they do not know what the other person will choose. A rock smashes scissors, so one who chooses rock over a partner’s scissors wins the round. Scissors cut paper, so one who chooses scissors over a partner’s paper wins the round. However, paper can wrap a rock up, so one who chooses paper over a partner’s rock will win the round. The choices must be made quickly, and a great deal of a person’s success at winning rounds is up to luck—or intuition as to what the other person is going to say [or what form their hand will have].
Discussion Life offers many choices. Fortunately, most of them do not have to be made as quickly as in the game, but some do. It is best to be in good practice in making the right choices. We can’t rely on luck, as we do in a game like this. However, we have one great advantage in making our choices in the game of life. We have our consciences. If we do what our consciences tell us, instructed by our parents, teachers, elders, and wisdom, we will make the right choices in life. Often, the right choices are simple—but they are not necessarily easy.
Questions for reflection
1. Have you ever had an experience like Joe’s in the story? If so, what did it feel like?
2. What is conscience?
3. Can you hear your conscience talking to you sometimes?
4. How does it make you feel? Does it “bother” you?
5. Do you have a Jiminy Cricket in your life who reminds you of what's right and wrong?
6. When are you aware of your conscience?
7. In what ways do your parents act as your conscience?
8. What would your life be like if you had no conscience?
9. What is guilt? Is it good or bad? Explain.
10. What is the best way to take care of your conscience?
Conscience and consequence
Think of a time when you followed your conscience and another time when you did not. What were the differences in results in these two occasions—both externally and internally? How did you feel afterward? What was a better experience?
When I followed:
When I didn't follow:
Imagine yourself
Imagine yourself in a situation where you are faced with a difficult choice. For example:
Your best friend asks you to tell her the answers on a science test
You promise your friend you will help him after school with his homework, but then suddenly you are invited out for some ice cream with someone else
You overhear some of your classmates speaking badly about one of your friends behind her back
Knowing yourself, what would you do in these situations? Describe the process by which you arrive at your decision. Is there a real, internal struggle, or is it pretty clear from the beginning what you would do? How do you think you would feel after putting your decisions, whatever they are, into practice?
.
Resources Study this Instructional video and show the students how to use a compass and map to navigate.
Show the movie Pinocchio before beginning the first discussion in the lesson.
Similar stories in various cultures
From the wikipedia article about Pinocchio: Pinocchio briefly appears in the 2001 movie Shrek and has a larger role in the 2004 sequel Shrek 2 and the 2007 sequel Shrek the Third. Pinocchio also appears in two episodes of the animated TV show The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: "Nursery Crimes / My Peeps" and "Billy Ocean", only this version needs to eat human flesh to become human and is evil. Japanesemanga artist Osamu Tezuka was inspired by this story when he created the popular icon Astro Boy. In addition, the story of Pinocchio was made into an anime television series by Tatsunoko Productions in 1972 as Kashi no Ki Mokku (Mokku the Oak Tree), and again by Nippon Animation in 1976 asThe Adventures of Piccolino (Pinocchio was renamed "Piccolino" in this version). Tatsunoko's series was shown on HBO in the United States in 1992 as Saban's Adventures of Pinocchio. The JapanesesuperheroKikaider (1972), created by Shotaro Ishinomori, was partly inspired by Pinocchio (and by Frankenstein's monster). A character named "Pino", who was inspired by the Pinocchio character, appeared in the video games Toy Pop (1986) and Wonder Project J(1995). Suggestion: Compare how the role of the conscience is shown in these various media.
Joe's story
Joe had gone into the forest for a few minutes of peace away from his many brothers and sisters. The sunlight streaming onto the forest floor, the soft crack of branches swaying in the summer breeze, the sounds of birdsong and rippling creeks calmed him down. He took a deep breath, swung around a slender tree trunk as if it were a partner in a dance, and smiled.Then his smile faded. Which direction was his house in? He started off one way, thinking it was right. Nothing looked familiar. Had he passed that tree on the way in? What about that rock? He didn't remember seeing that. Within a half hour, he was hopelessly lost in a forest that went on for miles—a forest that was populated with bears, deer—and hunters.
Joe slumped against a giant oak tree, trying to think what to do. As he sat there, he noticed the bulge in his front pants pocket. It was a compass his dad had given him on his birthday last week. He’d stuffed it in his pocket and forgotten about it. Now it was just the thing he needed. Joe knew that the needle of a compass always points north, and he knew there was a Speedy Chek grocery story just north of the forest. If he could get to that, he could find his way home.
With renewed energy, Joe set off. Whistling, he ran down hills, climbed rocks, and fought his way through some thick brush, always keeping an eye on the compass. Finally, through the trees, he could see the bright red-and-green neon sign of the Speedy Chek. He was almost home.
Discussion
Have you ever had an experience like Joe's? It can be very frightening. Luckily for Joe, he had a compass!As we pass through life, sometimes we will find ourselves in situations where we may not be sure of the right thing to do or the right path to take. During those times, we may feel lost and unsure, just like Joe did in the forest.
Fortunately, we have a built-in compass for just such situations. It's called our conscience, and it works to point us in the right direction
You may have seen the Disney movie Pinocchio. Jiminy Cricket plays the role of Pinocchio’s conscience, whispering in his ear or looking him in the eye and telling what is right to do.
Unfortunately, Pinocchio doesn’t always listen to Jiminy, and then he gets himself into trouble. This is an important point to remember. We all have a conscience, but we don’t necessarily listen to it. That’s when we make mistakes, do bad things, and get into trouble. Can you hear your conscience talking to you sometimes? How does it make you feel? Does it “bother” you? Do you have a Jiminy Cricket in your life, who reminds you what's right and wrong?
For children, their parents play the role of the conscience: “Time to stop watching TV and study for your test," "Please clean up your room before you go out," and "I have to go to a meeting—I need you to take care of your baby brother tonight.” Your parents are trying to get you to do the right thing, aren’t they? Sometimes you might feel they do it too much, and you may wish they would get “off your back.” Yet inside, we know they are right, and that they say these things to us because they care. They want us to grow up to be good and responsible people, so we can be happy as adults.
Eventually, our parents’ words become part of our thinking. When we start hearing these words inside ourselves, we know that our consciences are alive and well.
Right and wrong
The conscience is that part of ourselves that tells us the difference between right and wrong. Although sometimes it’s not easy to listen to our conscience, we should be very grateful that we have one.
Just think if people did not have consciences—in other words, no sense of right and wrong. In such a society we would be governed by the “law of the jungle" or “might makes right.” There would be no justice or fairness. People would do whatever they could get away with.
What really protects you when you walk down the street alone is that most people listen to their consciences and do not rob or attack but try to live in peace with others. The police cannot be everywhere. Without the power of the human conscience, society would be in complete chaos. The conscience is like a law within, urging people to do right and not wrong.
Some people say, "How can we know what is right and what is wrong? What’s right to one person is wrong to another." Even so, there is a lot of agreement about right and wrong. There is a generally accepted standard that acting unselfishly is good, while acting selfishly is bad. For example, everyone praises a person who leaps into a street full of traffic to rescue a child, risking himself for the child's safety. No one would praise someone who shrugged and said, "Too bad for the kid. Let her get run over as long as I'm safe." If you listen to your conscience, you will find that it encourages you to be unselfish, to act for the benefit of others, to share and to help, even at a sacrifice to yourself.
Guilt
Do you sometimes feel guilty when you’ve done something wrong? It’s a painful feeling, isn’t it? Nobody likes to feel guilty, because it hurts. At the same time, it is a good thing that we have the capability of feeling guilt, as it is a sign of an active conscience.
Think of it this way: What if you had no nerve endings in your fingers, so you had no sense of pain? If you put your hand over a stove burner, you wouldn’t feel anything. The same if you put your hand in icy water, pricked it with a pin, or even cut it with a knife. No pain. It sounds nice, doesn’t it? But it would be very dangerous. Feeling pain protects us from further hurting ourselves. It warns us of danger. Without it, we could seriously damage ourselves—even die.
Guilt performs a similar function. It is a warning to us that we have done something wrong, which is injurious to us and to others. If we never felt guilty about anything, we would end up doing all kinds of bad things. Although we may not like the feeling, guilt alerts us to what we have done wrong, so that we can take steps to make it right.
Developing our conscience
We can be thankful we have a conscience. But we have to take care of it to help it to develop properly. We have to be careful not to allow it to be corrupted, which can happen if we associate with people who do bad things, or if our minds are full of bad ideas. In the past, many people justified slavery in America by saying that black people were meant to be slaves. In Nazi Germany, normally decent people engaged in horrible acts of torture and killing of Jews under the belief they were doing good for society. These people's consciences were corrupted by bad ideas. People with more highly developed consciences had to fight against these wrongs and end the injustices.
We can come to believe that smoking, drinking, doing drugs, and having casual sexual relationships are all okay, especially if we associate with people who think and say they are. These things may not seem selfish or harmful, or else we might think we are only hurting ourselves by doing them. Yet that is not true. All these things affect and involve other people in a negative way: Second-hand smoke is more dangerous to other people than the smoke you take in yourself.
Drunken drivers kill many innocent people, including children, and almost all crime involves alcohol in some way. Drugs are connected to murderous crime networks, which you support when you use them. Casual sexual relationships always involve another person and their mental, emotional, and physical well-being—as well as having the potential to affect a child born of the relationship. These things are selfish and harmful, even if some people say they aren't.
Our consciences need to be educated in order to work well as guides. In the end the conscience is as strong as the ideas we listen to and believe in, and the virtues we practice. If we feed our minds with high ideals and act according to those ideals, our consciences will become stronger and stronger, serving as better and more accurate guides in the forest of life.
Game - Rock, paper, scissors
Two partners face each other. On the count of three, each of them chooses to say “Rock,” “Paper,” or “Scissors” [or hide one hand behind their back and on the count of three bring it out in the form of a rock, paper, or scissors]. Of course, they do not know what the other person will choose. A rock smashes scissors, so one who chooses rock over a partner’s scissors wins the round. Scissors cut paper, so one who chooses scissors over a partner’s paper wins the round. However, paper can wrap a rock up, so one who chooses paper over a partner’s rock will win the round. The choices must be made quickly, and a great deal of a person’s success at winning rounds is up to luck—or intuition as to what the other person is going to say [or what form their hand will have].
Discussion
Life offers many choices. Fortunately, most of them do not have to be made as quickly as in the game, but some do. It is best to be in good practice in making the right choices. We can’t rely on luck, as we do in a game like this. However, we have one great advantage in making our choices in the game of life. We have our consciences. If we do what our consciences tell us, instructed by our parents, teachers, elders, and wisdom, we will make the right choices in life. Often, the right choices are simple—but they are not necessarily easy.
Questions for reflection
1. Have you ever had an experience like Joe’s in the story? If so, what did it feel like?
2. What is conscience?
3. Can you hear your conscience talking to you sometimes?
4. How does it make you feel? Does it “bother” you?
5. Do you have a Jiminy Cricket in your life who reminds you of what's right and wrong?
6. When are you aware of your conscience?
7. In what ways do your parents act as your conscience?
8. What would your life be like if you had no conscience?
9. What is guilt? Is it good or bad? Explain.
10. What is the best way to take care of your conscience?
Conscience and consequence
Think of a time when you followed your conscience and another time when you did not. What were the differences in results in these two occasions—both externally and internally? How did you feel afterward? What was a better experience?
When I followed:
When I didn't follow:
Imagine yourself
Imagine yourself in a situation where you are faced with a difficult choice. For example:
Knowing yourself, what would you do in these situations? Describe the process by which you arrive at your decision. Is there a real, internal struggle, or is it pretty clear from the beginning what you would do? How do you think you would feel after putting your decisions, whatever they are, into practice?
.
Resources
Study this Instructional video and show the students how to use a compass and map to navigate.
Show the movie Pinocchio before beginning the first discussion in the lesson.
Similar stories in various cultures
From the wikipedia article about Pinocchio: Pinocchio briefly appears in the 2001 movie Shrek and has a larger role in the 2004 sequel Shrek 2 and the 2007 sequel Shrek the Third. Pinocchio also appears in two episodes of the animated TV show The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: "Nursery Crimes / My Peeps" and "Billy Ocean", only this version needs to eat human flesh to become human and is evil. Japanese manga artist Osamu Tezuka was inspired by this story when he created the popular icon Astro Boy. In addition, the story of Pinocchio was made into an anime television series by Tatsunoko Productions in 1972 as Kashi no Ki Mokku (Mokku the Oak Tree), and again by Nippon Animation in 1976 asThe Adventures of Piccolino (Pinocchio was renamed "Piccolino" in this version). Tatsunoko's series was shown on HBO in the United States in 1992 as Saban's Adventures of Pinocchio. The Japanese superhero Kikaider (1972), created by Shotaro Ishinomori, was partly inspired by Pinocchio (and by Frankenstein's monster). A character named "Pino", who was inspired by the Pinocchio character, appeared in the video games Toy Pop (1986) and Wonder Project J(1995).Suggestion: Compare how the role of the conscience is shown in these various media.